Currently, the nut industry uses a machine called a "monoboom" shaker for shaking of nuts from trees. An exemplary monoboom shaker is shown in FIG. 1 and is generally illustrated at 20.
The nut shaker 20 includes a tractor 21, a boom section 22 extending in a direction of travel of the tractor. Two head support arms 24 are mounted on a hollow sleeve 23. The hollow sleeve 23 is rotatably mounted on a rod 25. Rod 25 is fixed to the boom section 22 and extends perpendicular to boom section 22.
A shaker head 26 is connected to head support arms 24 by rubber mounts (not shown). The shaker head 26 includes jaws 32 which are movable towards and away from each other.
The ends 26 of the arms 24 are mounted to the piston and cylinder support section 28 by piston and cylinder assemblies, schematically shown by lines 30. The support section 28 is fixed to the boom section 22.
By actuation of the piston cylinder assembly schematically represented at 30, the shaker head 26 is allowed to tilt and roll with respect to boom section 22 by rotation of sleeve 23 about rod 25. The shaker head extends in a direction of travel of the tractor and in the direction of the longitudinal axis of the boom section 22.
For the shaking of trees, the nut shaker 20 as shown in FIG. 2 is driven between rows of trees 34 and rows of trees 36. Initially, the tractor 21 is driven in a line extending parallel to the rows of trees 34, 36. The tractor is then turned towards a tree as shown in FIG. 2 and the jaws 32 opened and then closed about a tree so as to shake the tree and force the fall of nuts from the tree.
The operator then opens the jaws of the shaking head and reverses the direction of the tractor 21. The operator then straightens out the direction of travel of the nut shaker so as to again proceed parallel to the direction of rows of trees 34 and 36 until turning into another tree and grasping the tree to repeat the procedure for producing the fall of nuts.
Under certain conditions, the maneuvering of the nut shaker 20 shown in FIGS. 1 and 2 is unacceptable to the grower. For instance, when the tree rows are close together and each of the trees of each row are planted close together in their respective row, it becomes difficult to maneuver the tractor with its forward extending boom section and shaker head.
It then becomes necessary to undergo the enormous expense of building a specialized machine 40 as shown in FIG. 3 having an overall length 42 which is substantially less than its width 44. Extending from the tractor is a shaker head 46 which moves in and out in the direction of arrow 48 so as to engage and shake a tree by clamping jaws 50. To contact an adjacent tree, the tractor 40 is driven in the direction of arrow 52 with the operator of the tractor facing perpendicular to the line of travel 52 as represented by the arrow 54.